Woman jailed after fraudulently selling Tomorrowland tickets

A woman from the UK has been jailed for two years and three months after selling over £100,000 worth of fraudulent festival tickets. 23-year-old Charmaine Bowers, an aspiring model and Labour party candidate, and her mother Tina Bowers, both plead guilty to six counts of fraud by false representation, the Lincolnshire Echo reports. The pair were involved in a fraud that lasted from December 2012 to July 2013 wherein they scammed “at least 311” people who paid up-front for their festival wristbands to Tomorrowland in Belgium. The Bowers forged fake confirmation slips and went as far as to use her own victims as patsies in the fraud, listing their names – not her own – to sell additional bands. The prosecutor found that the victims were defrauded out of £121,280 while Bowers transferred the money to her mother’s account and spent the remainder on lavish holidays.

He said: “Charmaine Bowers has been dishonest and devious to her victims and also to police throughout the investigation. She has never worked but having defrauded victims of their money has managed to spend £70,000 in four months on living the good life which had included holidays to Denmark and Rome, cruise holidays for her parents, as well as TVs, computers and mobile phones, jewelry and clothes. What was particularly sickening was her reference to ‘Happy Money’ on her bank accounts when transferring her ill-gotten gains to her mother’s bank account. There was nothing happy about the loss to the victims who were mostly young 18 to 30 year olds with little disposable income. Other victims have included veteran servicemen just back from Afghanistan on leave.”

He added: “I hope the custodial sentence given will allow Charmaine and Tina Bowers time to consider their crime and impact they had on their victims.”